Buggsy

Hi All,

Can anyone tell me if Silo is still worthwhile to buy as a modeller?

 

I don't do much free form modelling, I don't have the dollars required to buy FormZ or Rhino etc but I did purchase Silo when it was first paired with EIAS. I found there were a lot of deficiencies with it though, such as conveniently organising a model into groups etc. I saw a thread in the EIAS3D forum that said Silo's forum was moving to CG Society and that users speculated it would be the death of the program. I notice also Tomas likes the application.

 

I have a personal project that I am doing which will require modelling people, animals and the like. I don't know if Silo has grown substantially better or if the price tag is indicative of an application that is still unrefined. My point is, I suppose, that I can download Wings 3D for zero dollars and it appears to be as good as Silo was. Needless to say I need to be able to import the models into EI, whether that be via transporter or not doesn't really matter, there just needs to be a reasonable workflow to get them into EI and not have them compromised in the process. I vaguely remember having problems with Silo when it came to sub surface scattering, the model needed to be welded or something for it to work half decently in EI.

 

Some direction would be greatly appreciated.

 

Michael

I need some help with animating a quadruped, more specifically a goat. This is my 'kind of' first attempt at this and I'm starting to get blood shot eye's!

 

Trying to get bones to behave themselves is difficult and understanding how to rig the model with IK handles is an arduous task. I think I'm learning the thousand ways not to build a skeleton and a rig.

 

If anyone can point me in the direction of some current EIAS3d resources on rigging a quadruped, I would be greatly appreciated.

 

Michael

Hi Everyone,
Started my next animation which will hopefully be part of an architectural animation demo reel. To view it in its full quality select 720p from the Youtube viewer "Change Quality' menu (the cog).




Michael

Hi Everyone,
My first serious attempt at architectural animation. The first half of the video is just zooming in and out on the still shots but the last part is internal animation. There are 7.5M polygons in the external scenes and I'm not sure how to animate them yet.

This link was posted in the general section of this forum but thought it should be here.

Make sure you change the viewer to 720p if your internet connection is quick enough, its colour correction is better and obviously the image is sharper.


Michael

I have consistently been using EI since 2001. A large amount of my income these days comes from using it in my architectural services business. I have struggled though with the time frame required to produce a quality animation. I don't know if it's my approach, my skill level, incorrect use of the software or just that I am demanding too much from EI. My quicktime movies never seem to be smooth, I have to wait an entire day to render 5 seconds of animation, I don't understand how millions of polygons is talked about like it has no bearing on the rendering speed when it has a big impact, to get a good quality image without grain and noise requires rendering times in hours per frame even then when I import it into Final Cut Express HD the resulting quality is compromised, I can't seem to get a video onto my youtube channel that doesn't glitch and jump, #@!*&.............Ahhhhhhhhh.............

Ok, what are the secrets, who's been hiding them from me all this time and how do I purchase them or get them?

I have done a lot of animations but I guess my problem is what is a realistic production time for a given quality of video. What is too long a rendering time, per frame? Is Final Cut Express HD my problem? Is wanting a rendered resolution of HD (1920x1080) why I'm feeling frustrated? Should I choose a lower resolution with better anti-aliasing?

Please feel welcome and free to let me hear what everyone does. I want to add animations to the services I offer. I'm not talking about dodgy animations though. I mean eye catching, gob smacking, professional quality, polished stuff. I think EI can do it, it's just probably me that is having troubles finding the way.

Check out our website where you can see some of my adventures into animation and the architectural still stuff we do.
http://www.goodbuildingdesign.com.au/

Michael